Friday, May 20, 2005
9:00am - 3:00pm
North Shore Community College
1 Ferncroft Road, Danvers
Organized by:
Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation and
the Essex National Heritage Commission
Heritage landscapes are “places of the heart” that help define our quality of life and contribute to the region’s economy. The daylong symposium will explore the tools and opportunities that will enable our communities to protect the qualities most valued by residents while developing strategies for sustainable economic development.
With the goal of transforming opinion and policy at all levels and encouraging greater awareness and activism at the local level, participants in the daylong symposium will join symposium panelists in the creation of an agenda for action. Following the symposium, a summary action agenda will be sent to all of symposium attendees and posted on the ENHC website. The action agenda will serve as the basis for initiating further policy dialogue with state agencies, community leaders, and nonprofit organizations.
The Landscape of Opportunity symposium is the culminating element of the Essex County Reconnaissance Survey, a yearlong inventory of the region’s heritage landscapes undertaken jointly by the Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation and the Essex National Heritage Commission as part of DCR’s statewide Heritage Landscape Inventory Program.
Designed to assist and unite local land conservation and historic preservation efforts, 24 of Essex County’s 34 communities are participating in the inventory. Over 300 residents attended local identification meetings and the inventory’s consultant team conducted fieldwork in all participating communities. In all, nearly 1,000 heritage landscapes have been documented, the largest such undertaking in Massachusetts since 1980.
